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This year's X Factor winner announced

Songstress Samantha Jade has revived her music career after being the first woman to win the X Factor.

The West Australian won a recording contract with Sony Music and a car on Tuesday night after receiving more viewer votes on the Seven Network show than likeable country kid Jason Owen.

Jade had contemplated walking away from music after a three-year deal with a US record company turned sour and only one single was released.

X Factor was the 25-year-old's last crack at a singing career and she was even lucky to make final.

Three times during the series she was put up for elimination - more than any other contestant - and only once did the judges bother to save her.

On the other two occasions the judges sent the decision to deadlock, which reverted to the viewer votes.

Each time the viewers saved her and it was the viewers again who elevated her to victory and delivered the dream result.

"Thank you so much for believing in me and giving me another chance," she said immediately after winning.

Jade, who wore a green, black and white sexy geometrical sequined dress, thanked her mentor and friend Guy Sebastian and his wife Jules for their guidance.

Sebastian came under some criticism early for choosing a friend to be a part of his final three.

The petite pop princess will release her winning "debut" X Factor single What You've Done To Me after winning the series and already, because of her mannerisms, stature and style, she's being compared to Kylie Minogue.

Jade's debut album, titled Samantha Jade, will be released on December 7 and feature re-recorded versions of the renditions she performed during the series.

Jade will now headline the X Factor Australian tour, which starts on January 8 at Jupiters Casino on the Gold Coast and finishes 10 days later at Sydney's Horden Pavilion.

The final six artists on the show will perform on the tour.

Hopes of X Factor fashioning a manufactured boy band as the winner were dashed early when The Collective were the first of the finalists eliminated.

The Collective comprises five males, aged between 17 and 22, who originally auditioned as solo artists.

They have pledged to stay together and release songs in the hope of rising from the ashes of the final in the same way One Direction did after they finished third on the UK version of the series.